Leave It To The Instinct
by MonAlice
Summary: It takes up exactly from the ending of 5x10 'Let Them Eat Cake" and adjusts it a bit to my Huddy liking. Hopefully House stays in character, Cuddy remains of screen but is largely thought of. Currently meant as a oneshot.


A/N This piece of fiction haunted my brain from the moment I watched 5x10 'Let Them Eat Cake' couple of days ago. I totally thought the stunt the writers pulled on me (and other Huddy-fanciers) was really awful, so this is my take on righting the wrongs of the ending. Also as it is a belated St. Nicholaus Day gift for myself and my 'sister' Maple Fay. Enjoy and don't flame pls.

Disclaimer: _IF_ I owned them they would have been together like eons ago!

"Again, thanks for the opportunity. There hasn't been much for me job-wise lately, and here I've gotten to have a great time _and _earn some cash."

House shrugged.

" I already told you, it was _my_ pleasure. And by saying that, I was not in any way courteous- I simply don't like to share what's mine. And stop with the yapping, you turn less attractive when you do that, little girl. " He said with mock attempt at patronization. She pouted but her eyes still twinkled mischievously. Wouldn't he be otherwise- what's the term? - interested, she could have been a nice distraction. Damn.

"C'mon. If I'm to give you a … _lift,_" he couldn't help furrowing his brows suggestively. " we should be going."

"Sure" She rested her hands playfully on both sides of his open jacket. "That's something, considering how you rejected my alternate driving suggestions. Maybe that's because of your pleasure sharing issues, huh? Maybe you just don't like company. " she faked gasping dramatically. He was too outraged and shocked by her mere cheek to respond her right away, and then he noticed it would have been pointless anyway, as she wasn't really paying any attention to him now . It seemed that for a moment her focus shifted away from him, further to her right, but after a split of a second she was – yet again, looking at him smirking with a highly suspicious mirth .

"And now I know _why_ you were so _immune_ to my charms. If you had succumbed, your girlfriend would be probably even less thrilled than she was a moment ago."

He scoffed at her wording ( 'succumb' ?! Really…) and then dove in for the full rant.

"I don't have a... " he stopped abruptly mid-sentence. "Girlfriend?!" his tone was demanding now.

"Yup. Hot skinny brunette in her forties. Killer figure. And face expression."

Crap.

"Killer Bee Queen is not my girlfriend! She's my boss!"- he opposed somewhat weakly ( for himself. The damn girl had no chance to _know_.)

"Say what you will, _doctor,_ but her face was wearing all _symptoms_ of grirfriendhood when she had her first peek in here. Not so much afterwards."

Damn. The girl somehow _knew_. Crap again. And what's with the medical terms usage?– his mind wondered as on it's own.

"Actually she looked very pissed. And sad." the girl continued.

Crap in overdose. Whole buckets of crap. His mind began racing while the brain kicked the motor functions and peripheral conversation skills in.

"I'll deal with her later. Shall we?" She nodded wistfully and out they went. He gave her a ride home, waved good bye and headed home himself.

Gregory House has always known his own worth and abilities. Unfortunately conveying his higher feelings was not one of the latter. Even more so to the people he actually cared about. If he ever cared, as it was something he was not often ready to admit most of all to himself.

Friendship with Wilson, was rather easy, because they were guys and guys didn't exactly need to go all mushy on each other. (Even if Wilson acted like a girl on numerous and documented occasions.) Till nothing more serious rocked their boat, their –widely perceived as twisted- friendship was ok. Amber's death was a close call, and Wilson's reaction to him afterwards, his own inability to approach him without the proverbial foot in his mouth, got him more scared than he would ever admit. Really scared if he admitted it at all.

For the first time since Stacy, he was reminded that very effective but mostly asocial mouth of his was capable of so much damage when it came to delicate tissue of relationships. Also the bizarre hypnotic experience of relieving a bus crash, and several weeks afterwards brought a rather unpleasant thoughts to his usually clear-of-that–sort-of-emotional-crap mind. He concluded that the only two people he could even remotely describe as close to him were Wilson and Cuddy, which with Wilson being estranged for a while, naturally led him to focus more on all things Cuddles.

Their years of richly subtexted banter, mutual though quite reluctant (mostly on his part) respect , and her accusations about his alleged partiality to her feminine wiles all seemed to be adding up for him lately. Certainly he's always found her physically appealing, hell, they even consummated the attraction at one point in their Michigan days. Still, there was something more, something that made him go to great lengths to annoy her, invade her personal life, and scare off all of her men. He's always claimed that it was to protect the fellow men, but in view of his latest near-death experience induced discoveries, he decided trying to be truthful and not deflecting might be for once, a way to go. The results of self-introspection were quite interesting if scary. As in: she's been right all along, and he deed indeed have hots for her. Even more, he did indeed like her, their recent kiss having played a major role in him actually realizing that development.

It would be fine if he even had a moment to explore, what all of it actually meant for him, but no-o-o, both Wilson and Cuddy had to uncannily pick up on his mood change and start pestering him in all ways possible. Wilson willed him again and again to ask her out, her doe eyes sought him out ever so often as if pleading for him to actually do something. Did they really know him so little, not to know he'd never acted well on compulsion? That, and the thing with him being virtually unable to actually go and say something to her. Also her latest stunt, the annoyingly close presence in his office didn't help him much. He feared that anytime, he would be too much of himself around her, and would scare her off permanently. Normally he wouldn't even be thinking that, but an increasing number of hurt glances he was getting from her, and the fact that they now had this highly-untangible-and-easy-to-fuck-up thing going on, made him constantly think she could pull out the vulnerability card any second. Or perhaps he was paranoid. Or perhaps just as he once mocked his friend concerning CB, he was just needing Wilson with boobs, looking great, willing to have a lot of sex, watch Monstertruck and still not go overly emotional on him.

Scratch the sex-and-Wilson-in-one-sentence part though.

Still, even in the midst of the inner battle, he knew that all these thoughts were just a distraction. Something his mind presented him with, knowing his love of the puzzles. But this puzzle was an illusion. He could tell because something primal within him, came to recognize Cuddy as his prospective mate. He could analyze what he wanted, but all inner turmoil aside, he knew he wanted her. All of her. Her strengths, and weaknesses. Her reason for his folly, her input for his work, her vulnerability for his access to her deepest thought and ability protection of her well being. And yet his failure to communicate, in signals recognizable by the other sex was evident and constraining. And vastly frustrating.

The desk was supposed to help say things without actually saying them , and it seemed to have proven helpful up to a certain extend. But then the blond actress happened and foiled the meticulously forged plan like a house of cards. He felt the urge to rush after Cuddy, but knowing him, and her this wouldn't end so well. She would be angry and spiteful, he would make some innocent if slightly inappropriate remark, and she would be all over him with her claws. And not in a good way.

No, he had to go back to the planning and scheming. Show his woman he really cared. Like a male predator bringing prey as a betrothal gift to his partner. The desk was good up till now, but current situation demanded some bigger and more daring measures to be taken, so that his alpha female would accept him as a proper partner. And he already knew that she would accept no pseudo-intellectual bullshit from him, after all the stunts she's already endured.

What was the name of her favorite café back on UM campus? He wondered if they'd be willing to rearrange the interior design, for the right amount of money paid for parting with the old one.A lately closed Italian restaurant in the close proximity of the hospital was just begging to be properly refurnished…

His lips curled in a predatory- yet almost joyful smile, as he grabbed his whisky glass from the piano, and limped towards the computer. The time came to google and bargain, a modern way to get what the primal instincts demanded of him.

xoxoxo

Reviews are love.


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